If Jennifer Hallet had a superpower more subtle than shouting, it was her ability to make you question yourself. Because, ultimately, money mattered, especially with Amelie in the picture. And maybe the mature thing to do was to swallow her pride and leave everything to the professionals. After all, if Jennifer was right—and Rosaline thought she probably was—then she could be throwing away the very opportunity she came on the show to get.
“Look.” One more try. Then she’d cave. “If that’s the story you’re telling, why can’t I be the one to tell it? Because, yes, you’re right. I’ve got things out of the show, and I’m a stronger, more confident person because of it. Which is why I’m pissing you off so much right now.”
Jennifer Hallet’s eyes had narrowed in a way that was either very good or very, very bad. “You’ve been pissing me off for a lot longer than that, but I’m listening.”
“You’ve got a file on me. You know the deal. I got pregnant at nineteen and now I’m a single mum in a dead-end job. But my parents have never made me feel anything but shitty about myself. So I don’t want them to be part of my story. Not when there are people in my life—like Amelie and my ex-girlfriend Lauren—who can say all of this, but the difference is that when they say they’re proud of me, they’ll fucking mean it.”
“Fine. The moppet will probably play better anyway.”
“On top of which—Wait. What?”
“You win, sunshine.” It was hard to tell just then if Jennifer Hallet was secretly respecting Rosaline or hating her guts. “But if this isn’t the most heartwarming bucket of oversweetened bull semen I’ve ever poured down the throat of the nation, I will come to you in the night and burn your pubes while you sleep.”
Rosaline felt actually slightly dizzy with adrenaline, success, and several mental images she really hadn’t wanted. “Okay. Deal.”
And so, with Rosaline’s tiny living room stuffed full of filming equipment and production crew, Lauren and Amelie sat on the sofa and tried to take Colin Thrimp seriously.
“What’s it been like,” he was asking, in the terminally misguided tone of somebody who thought he was good with children, “having Mummy on Bake Expectations?”
“It’s been good. I’ve been staying with Auntie Lauren and she tells me things she’s not supposed to and lets me get away with murder.”
“I do not,” Lauren protested.
“You bloody well do,” said Rosaline from the doorway.
Colin Thrimp wrung his hands. “Um, ladies. Can we make sure this is usable footage? Amelie, would you say that Mummy has, for example, made a lot of cakes?”
Amelie nodded emphatically. “Yes.”
“Could you say that, please?”
“Why?”
“So I can film you saying it.”
“But you’ve said it.”
“I’m not going to be on the television. You’re going to be on the television. So you need to say the things. And what I’d really like you to say is something nice about your mummy.”
“Oh.” Amelie seemed to be thinking about this for a moment. “I am very happy Mummy’s on Bake Expectations because it means she’s made loads of cakes and normally I have to eat healthily because she’s a responsible parent. Which is why social services shouldn’t come and take me away.”
There was a moment while Colin Thrimp listened to his earpiece. “No, no—I think that’s fine. We’ll just cut the bit about social services.”
“Don’t cut that bit,” said Amelie. “That’s the important bit.”
“Amelie darling.” Despite it being fairly early in the afternoon and there being, Rosaline could have sworn, none left in the house, Lauren had somehow acquired a glass of wine. “I keep telling you social services wouldn’t want you.”
“Why not? I’m great. I’m obstreperous.”
“That’s not a good thing,” Rosaline told her.
Amelie did a stubborn pointy thing with her chin that Rosaline hoped she hadn’t picked up from her. “It means noisy and difficult to control. And I don’t want to be easy to control because people being easy to control is how Hitler happened.”
“So, Lauren.” Colin Thrimp made a sort of clapping gesture to remind everybody he was still there. “You’ve known Rosaline for a long while. Would you say this is the first time Rosaline has really done something for herself?”
One of Lauren’s many skills was that she could laugh in your face from the other side of the room. “God no. She does things for herself all the time. You should see her bedside drawer.”
Amelie, too, took this poorly. “That’s a mean thing to say. Mummy’s very clever. She can do lots of things for herself. She can tie her shoes and she always remembers to brush her teeth in the morning and in the evening. She couldn’t fix the boiler but that’s because boilers are complicated. And she never learned to drive but that’s because she had a baby instead of driving lessons.”
“Oh, that’s interesting,” Colin Thrimp pounced. “Are there lots of things your mummy hasn’t been able to do because of you?”
Rosaline pushed her away through the forest of cameras. “Colin, say anything like that again and I will go to broadcasting standards and the press and fuck what the contract says.”
“Sorry. I . . . I . . . didn’t mean it to come out like that. I just meant, well, you’ve obviously made a lot of sacrifices.”
“Amelie’s not a sacrifice.”
“I’m a mammal,” agreed Amelie. “We learned that in science. You’re a mammal too.”
This made Colin Thrimp retreat into his mic again. “Look, you promised Jennifer you’d behave. I need to make some kind of story out of this; otherwise, you’re going to be the one without an arc and nobody will like you and that will be my fault and I’ll get fired. And please ask your friend to put down the wineglass.” He was sounding perilously close to tears. “The only people we ever show drinking are students out with their friends and it’s never more than two friends and it’s always a quiet pub.”
“Fine.” Lauren downed her wine and passed the glass to a production assistant. “The pissing thing about Rosaline—sorry, BBC audience. The thing about Rosaline is that she’s one of the kindest, strongest, most amazing people you’ll ever meet. But until she went on this show, I don’t think she ever realised it. She’s always been a fighter, she’s always stood up for herself, and deep down she’s always known what she wanted. Problem was, she used to worry far too much about what other people thought. But now she’s done so well on the show and that’s given her the confidence to realise everyone else can go fuck themselves.”
“That was mostly lovely,” said Colin Thrimp, “and exactly what we were looking for. But could we possibly have the last sentence again without the f-word.”
Lauren cleared her throat. “But,” she went on, “now she’s done so well on the show and that’s given her the confidence to realise that the people you want in your life are the people who love you no matter what.”